A/N: The chapter is rated PG-13/T for explosions.

Chapter 14: The Supreme Lord Of The Bathroom Strikes

My defensive strategy took Percy, Beckendorf, and me on an arc over the East Coast. I picked out a ring of cities in a sixty-mile radius from Manhattan: tight enough to hedge our bets if Kronos chose a concentrated attack; loose enough that if he spread his forces, we could still catch them before they congregated. Admittedly, the coastline remained a weak link in my plan, but I'd figure out something else for that. Maybe we could track down Luke's cruise ship ... but that was a different strategy for a different mission.

We rigged the toll booths on the Jersey Turnpike near Edison to shoot Celestial bronze darts at every vehicle that came through (they couldn't hurt any mortals, but monsters would get a deadly face-full if they tried). In Morristown, we activated a statue of George Washington that Daedalus had configured to spew bronze mist—harmless to mortals, but guaranteed to knock out any monster or demigod that attacked it (I hoped no neutral demigod was foolhardy enough to go randomly poking the bronze cast of a son of Athena). And, in a serious coup by Beckendorf, we managed to trip-line the entire compound of a Monster Donut near the Greek colonnades in West Point. Any monsters who fancied a snack would be netted in high quality Celestial bronze fibres (Hephaestus-certified).

It was in the Parsippany-Troy Hills that we spotted the tour bus.

I probably wouldn't have considered this township—it was small, with only one notable landmark that was of little interest unless you were an architecture buff—but Daedalus had left one important note about the place: demigod campsite, 1908.

I didn't know what Daedalus meant. Had it been an offshoot of Camp Half-Blood, or had the camp relocated there temporarily? Or had there been a completely different group of demigods running around in the hills, maybe unclaimed children of minor gods like the ones who had flocked to Kronos en masse? Camp Half-Blood's American roots definitely went as far back as the Civil War, but the exact time it had migrated to this continent depended on when the central seat of Western power had crossed the Atlantic. Maybe just after the Revolutionary War.

Once we got there, it was easy to see why Parsippany-Troy would have made an excellent campsite. It was a lush valley of rich farmland, bordered by towering mountains on the east, freshwater lakes to the north and south, and wetlands on the west.

And the Stickley Arts and Crafts Museum looked almost exactly like our Art and Crafts cabin (before I'd redesigned it, that is). I was willing to bet its architect was a sibling of mine. The log house had apparently launched its own architectural movement in the early twentieth century. Whether Gustav Stickley had adopted the designs from camp or vice versa, they seemed like proof that the place had once served as a demigod hangout.

'I wonder what happened,' Beckendorf said. 'It'd be kind of cool to have more campsites across the country, you know? Easier for demigods who live far away to actually get to camp.'

I'd never really thought about where Beckendorf's real home was. He'd been a year-round camper ever since he'd crash-landed in the canoe lake with a flying Greek trireme six years ago. In retrospect, I should have asked, but then none of us really liked to talk about our journeys to camp. They invariably involved monsters, death, or both.

'I guess they didn't have a good border like ours,' I said. 'Camp only works because the monsters can't get in.'

'Would you go to camp in San Francisco if you had the option?' Percy asked.

For some reason, the question made my cheeks grow hot. 'Well, no. That's different.' Even though my school and family was on the West Coast now, I'd been at Camp Half-Blood forever. I could never imagine being anywhere else. 'We should check out the farmhouse. Daedalus didn't leave specifics, but they must have had some basic defences.'

'If not,' Beckendorf patted his bag of supplies, 'we'll set up our own.'

An enormous double-decker tour bus pulled up outside the farmhouse museum, the kind you usually see rolling up to tourist hotspots like Disneyland or Atlantic City. It was strange that so many tourists would want to explore the history of the Arts and Crafts Movement. I mean, I found it fascinating, but this sort of place usually only drew kids forced into field trips during the school term.

'Guys.' Percy dragged us through the museum door. 'Look.'

He pointed out of the windows. The bus doors had just opened. A group of little old ladies descended. This would have been perfectly normal, except these senior citizens had gossamer wings sticking out of their knitted shawls. Their shrivelled arms and legs were not due to age, but the fact that they had bird claws and talons instead of regular limbs.

'Harpies!' I hissed. 'And not the good kind.'

Percy grimaced. 'Are there ever good kinds?'

'You know what I mean—not like the ones at camp.' I squinted at the lettering on the side of the tour bus. It said something like TITANIC TOURS. 'Those are Kronos's harpies.'

After the harpies came a trio of ogres—ten-foot giants with four hair arms apiece. That explained the size of the bus. These ugly dudes would never have fit in an ordinary coach.

The ogres were followed by bare-chested Laistrygonians with naughty tattoos over their hairy torsos, slithering snake women on trunk-like serpent legs, and—rounding off the group bizarrely—a pack of perky cheerleaders in purple and black uniforms with pom-poms to match. One of them did a cartwheel right off the bus.

'Empousai,' Percy groaned. 'I hate those demons.'

'Quick, in here!' We ducked into the nearest toilet as the monsters filed into the reception area. The empousai were complaining loudly as they entered.

'Whose idea was it to come here? It's like, totally boring.'

'Yeah, there isn't even, like, a gift shop!'

'Oh, be quiet,' snapped a harpy. 'You dragged us through the Mall of America when we passed through Bloomington. You can take an hour of historical sightseeing.'

The museum receptionist didn't seem to find it strange that a horde of monster tourists were crowding her lobby. With the Mist, she probably thought they were senior citizens chaperoned by high school students racking up community service hours.

'You must be the three o'clock tour! I have your booking right here. If you'll just wait a moment, your guide will be right along. Can I offer you some Trojan Water? It's bottled straight from the Parsippany Lakes!' She passed out plastic bottles like candy.

One of the ogres swigged the proffered Trojan Water and pulled a face (which didn't look all that different from his regular expression). 'Wish the boss would hurry up with his plans. I'm sick of sightseeing. I wanna smash some demigod heads!'

'Boss has his reasons,' scolded a dracaena. 'If he says wait, we wait. And besides, I'd much rather tour the fifty states than wait down below. Tartarus is so lame.'

As promised, the tour guide showed up a moment later. 'All right, folks!' He clapped his hands together and beamed at the disgruntled monsters, either not noticing or not caring that half of them were less than thrilled to be here. I guess he did this spiel often for disinterested school tours. He led the entire group into the building without losing his perky smile.

Once they disappeared into the next room, Beckendorf muttered, 'Let's get out of here.'

I put a hand on his arm. 'Wait. This is a huge opportunity.'

Percy looked at me incredulously. 'A huge opportunity to get ourselves killed if we don't leave before they come back!'

'Yes, but we came out here to booby trap places like this so they'd take out monsters that pass through.'

'Except we didn't have time to set any traps,' Percy pointed out. 'And look how many there are. How are we supposed to take them all on?'

'Blow the place up?' Beckendorf suggested. 'I have supplies.'

'You sound like Clarisse.'

'I'd do it with more finesse,' Beckendorf grumbled. 'All Clarisse knows about is dynamite.'

I peeked through the toilet door. The receptionist was humming to herself as she wrote in a notebook. She'd left a bottle of Trojan Water on the counter. It gave me an idea.

'No,' I said. 'We're not destroying an architectural landmark if we can help it. Not to mention, mortals might get caught in the crossfire. What we need is something more stealthy.'

I told them the plan.

OoOoO

I sent Beckendorf off to the tour bus with my invisibility cap. He would take charge of one half of the plan. The other part depended on Percy.

'You want me to do what?' he said when I told him what to do.

'Make the toilets explode,' I repeated.

'I thought you said we weren't blowing the place up.'

'Messing up the plumbing isn't the same as blowing up the building,' I said. 'And we need to make sure the monsters don't use the facilities before they get back on their bus. They're bound to be, uh, full up after all that water.'

'Remind me again why we want their bladders bursting when they get back on the road?'

'Because that gives Beckendorf a trigger for his explosives—the flush system. If the plan goes well, it will activate when the bus is well away from here, but before it reaches any other town.'

Percy turned this over in his head. 'It's brilliant,' he admitted. 'But are you sure monsters even use toilets?'

I punched his shoulder. 'Can you mess up these toilets or not, Seaweed Brain?'

Percy screwed up his face like he had constipation. A second later, the water in the toilet bowls sloshed out onto the floor. Wet, but not exactly devastating. The toilets were surprisingly well-maintained.

'Um, that's a start, I guess, but could you, like, make it really bad? Remember we want them totally out of order.'

Percy furrowed his brow. 'I don't like to make a habit of blowing up toilets, you know.'

'You got the ones at Camp Half-Blood pretty good once.'

'It's good motivation when someone's trying to give you a swirlie.'

'I could always try to stick your head in,' I offered.

'Ha ha. No thanks, Wise Girl.' Percy thought for a moment. 'Just give me a sec.' He concentrated again, but this time the expression that flooded his face was less stomachache and more I'm gonna murder someone.

The stalls vibrated. The faucets hummed. It was all according to plan, but I started to regret asking Percy to do this. His eyes darkened. His hands balled into fists.

He grabbed my wrist. 'Get out of here.'

I didn't argue. I hurried out the door. A moment later, I heard the unmistakable sound of bursting pipes. Dirty, foul-smelling water seeped out from the crack under the door. The receptionist looked up in alarm.

Percy burst from the toilet, completely dry except for the sheen of sweat across his forehead. His expression had mostly cleared; only his eyes still held a trace of the seething rage he'd called up.

'Hey!' cried the receptionist. 'What did you do?'

Percy looked between us and marched out of the building without a word. I gave the receptionist an apologetic look. 'Pipes must've burst. You might want to get an out-of-order sign up.'

I found Percy alone in the parking lot, mopping at his brow with his shirt sleeve. I'd never thought much about how demigods with magic powers summoned them (Athena kids didn't have magic, after all; we had to rely on our wits and logic). I guess it made sense that Percy needed angry energy to produce bigger explosions. The times I'd seen him really summon his power had all been emotionally-charged. Clarisse's attempted swirlie aside, there'd been the time he'd doused a forest fire during the Battle of the Labyrinth. Or who could forget Mount St Helens, when he'd drawn so strongly on a supply of glacial water that he'd unleashed the worst volcanic explosion in decades?

I couldn't help wondering just how much he could do, if he got mad enough.

'Hey,' I said. 'You okay?'

'Yeah,' he said after a brief pause.

'What were you thinking about in there? That got you mad enough to ...'

A cloud passed over his face. 'You don't wanna know.'

'I'm sorry. I didn't think—'

'It's fine.' His tone made it clear he didn't want to discuss it further. 'Let's go find Beckendorf.'

OoOoO

Beckendorf finished rigging his bombs not a moment too soon. He got back to us just as the monsters finished their tour and poured out of the museum. I noted with satisfaction that most of their complementary Trojan Water bottles were empty.

'It shouldn't take long,' I said. 'As soon as the first monster hits the toilet ...'

'Greek-fire-in-a-box,' Beckendorf said. 'The flush will break it open, and—'

'Ka-boom,' Percy finished.

We summoned our pegasi and followed the bus from a safe distance behind. It was trundling across an empty stretch of highway when the flush triggered, perfectly to plan.

The explosion was more beautiful than all the Fourth of July fireworks combined.

'Good job, guys,' Percy said. 'Let's go home.'

OoOoOoOoOoOoO

A/N: To any residents of the Parsippany-Troy township (probability that I have a reader from there is low, but who knows?), I hope I haven't misrepresented your region. Most of my research comes from Wikipedia, and you can read more about the Stickley Museum at Craftsman Farms at their website.

Beckendorf's history is a little head-canon I have. I always thought he had something to do with the Greek trireme bead on Annabeth's necklace, but it's a story I've not really had the chance to flesh out more.

The little adventure here is indeed a fleshing out of Percy's comment about Beckendorf rigging a bus to go boom as soon as the first harpy went flush.

A big thank you this week to samuraipanda85, Solangelo, Hello, Anonymously96, ArtimuosJackson, Guest, JustADerangedFanGirl, Captain Photon, SenatorSteve, allen r, and Numberfivewithabullet for your comments! The encouragement is great, especially since I had a rough start to the week ... but it's ended well enough. Here's to the weekend, and next week, looking up!